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Tag Archives: organization

Basically a leader should have the ability to impress, influence and
mould his subordinates, followers and others concerned to accept,
follow and implement his thoughts, ideas and proposals. In my
opinion, that situation is best, when we can motivate a person to work
willingly on his own. However, a leader can use different types of methods
including using coercion or giving of various lucrative offers, for obtaining results. But, a good leadership should properly arrange to select, train initially & periodically, ascertain and allocate suitable areas of working, provide reasonable package, perks and motivation, be honest, transparent, balanced and fair in all dealings of salary raise, bonus, training, promotions, posting and managing and make the persons feel that the organization is theirs,
more than that of the leader. This culture is likely to lead to fast and certain success of the organization. Though for obtaining results, for leadership, there are several other factors also, some of which may be in our hands and some beyond. At least we must do our best in the areas where we can.

Everyone who is in service, whether Government or private, needs leave some time or the other, for various reasons. This may be for short or long duration, planned or unexpected due to some emergent situations. Normally an organization sets down some rules giving types of leave, number of days of leave available in one year, possibility of accumulation of leave for encashment at some point of time in life, method of obtaining sanction etc. But regarding availing leave, there are problems faced in real life, due to different types of situations, employees as well as bosses for sanctioning of leave required.

Some employees do take leave with proper planning and prior sanction, with minimum number of unplanned needs. On the other hand, some persons may just not bother about the requirements of the organization or of their colleagues, or obtaining proper sanction of the leave and they may go on long leave and extend from there without bothering about its effect on the planned leave of others. Such persons are too selfish and they may be able to manage with the boss any time and every time, but there is always an end to everything. Employees should realize that frequently going on leave and sometimes with fake reasons or excuses, indicates their own character, disturbs the planned leave programme of the colleagues, tells upon their own performance as well as that of the organization. After checking the record of leave taken and assessing the real reasons, we may question and confront the employees. In addition to the keeping of records by the employers, the employees themselves, should also keep a record of the details of the leave taken by them, for controlling their own leave requirements. People should know that this is also one of the factors for considering their betterment, future career, promotion, perks, posting and transfer, etc. There is another point, when due to exigencies of service, presence of the employee(s) is considered essential and the leave when needed by some employees, may not be granted. This is more applicable to Government personnel.

Bosses are also of different types. Most of the bosses ask the employees to plan their long leave well in advance, preferably at the beginning of the calendar year and then they adjust/reduce the requirements so that all can avail long leave sometime or the other. But it is possible that they may keep the interests of their persons safe and uppermost in their mind and not bother much about others. One employee requested for 5 days casual leave, so as to make one full week, for bringing his wife back from her parental home. He was intimated in writing saying that since five others are on long leave, it cannot be sanctioned. In spite of personal request, leave was not sanctioned even for 4 or 3 or 2 or 1 day. Perforce he requested for outstation leave for the two holidays in that week which was then granted. During this period he went home and brought his family back. Since distance of the destination was long, his stay in the parental home was just for a few hours. What an amount of stress he and his family must have faced? Sometimes, to accommodate the requirements of long leave of someone, leave of some others may be cut short, modified or adjusted, even on some false pretext, without bothering about the exact requirements. Sometimes even for the person’s own marriage, leave may not be granted more than for 7 or 10 days. On the other hand, the leave of their favourite persons may be given at will. The boss should ensure that every person should go on annual long leave to rejuvenate and return with more energy and enthusiasm and that there is uniformity in application of rules and the interests of all employees are safe guarded. But this is probably more possible in private organizations. Of course there is life besides the office or the organization, but, it goes without saying that the main thrust of everybody has to be on that thing, which gets them funds for their livelihood.

There was an organization, to which young educated persons used to be attracted to join, but will get disillusioned soon after joining, and would then like to leave for better pastures elsewhere. These could be the competitive examinations, entrepreneurship or going overseas. It appeared that it was like stop-gap arrangement for such persons. But there were several other persons of medium and higher age group, who could not leave and had to serve there only and retire from there. Thus the rate of such persons leaving the organization was high. The organization was also hard put to stress, due to the frequent recruiting procedures, their training and then their leaving arrangements, causing more problems and vacuum than help and assistance from them Apart from this, there was another problem. There was a regular tradition of welcoming a new employee and giving farewell to a retiring, transferring or leaving employee. As a result, there were too many farewell functions for such young persons, leaving the organization. Besides increasing the organization load, it also increased the expenditure of such functions due to the involvement of expenses for gift, High Tea etc. As these expenses were met by contributions from the existing employees, at one stage, some bickering were also heard in whispering voices. Then a surprise was created when one such young person leaving the organization, quietly offered to host the High Tea, thus offsetting some amount from the total budget, which remained mainly for the gift for the outgoing employee. This welcome gesture was appreciated by everyone and then adopted as a regular measure. This was an innovative and creative method of sharing the expenses and resolving, not a problem but strained views or feelings.

Any parting is generally sad, but in some cases it may even be otherwise. It is interesting to note the observations of the person going out and the persons who continue to be in the organization. It may present a widely different picture. An effort has been made to study some of the happenings at the time of retirement/transfer of persons. One person arranged an elephant and went home riding the elephant from the office to his house, where he had arranged a lunch for all of his colleagues. Some persons hire a taxi or some other vehicle or go in the normal manner to their residence, but still arrange food for their friends. In some cases, the people go on cycles or two wheelers in a procession up to the house of the retiring person, who arranges tea and snacks or lunch or dinner for them. Some make arrangements in a reasonable hotel even. Sometimes the person is accompanied by just one or two persons or not even accompanied at all. In some places the officer stands on a jeep and the jeep is then pulled by ropes by his colleagues at least for some distance symbolically and then the vehicle runs on fuel and goes forward. One person appeared to be so upset and depressed on the last day that he drank and drank and as a result died on the same day, i.e. the last day of his retirement. Some persons are not able to accept their retirement and they continue to come to their office or factory or the organization at the usual hours for several days after their retirement. Some cry at that time due to losing contact with their friends of many years. In some cases, where the bosses have been very rude and non-cooperative, employees pay them in same coin and at that time the boss becomes helpless. They may face hostile environment like black flag demonstrations both outside and inside the organization premises, while departing by train or air or by road. Consequently, some of such bosses do not disclose their exact departure details. On the contrary, for some of the good bosses, some employees even weep. When a selfish and bad boss leaves a job or is transferred, some employees light lamps of pure ghee to express their happiness and give vent to their feelings. Relationship management is therefore very important in any organization. People want that their work life and also home life, should both give them happiness and not stress. Some of the bad bosses may not get a good farewell or no farewell at all and may go out humiliated or it may look that the employees are not concerned about this event. Some are treated to sumptuous food and even given gifts or mementoes as a mark of respect and token of remembrance. In some cases, some representatives of employees do come to see them off at the time of their departure from that place, garland them and even decorate the vehicle or the cabin of the train they are travelling in, by using garlands/flowers.

In any organization, normally there are several meetings organized for various objectives. It is another point whether it is a productive and creative use of the time for achievements. The senior and junior officers conduct and /or participate in these meetings. There are meetings organized in hotels, over working lunches and working dinners, where lunch and dinner are probably more important than working. In the meeting, the boss will prove that he is the boss. But arranging meetings has a positive side also. These keep us busy and engaged, since an empty mind is a devil’s workshop. In spite of having participated in many meetings and also conducted several meetings, I do not consider them to be so much useful. While the objective is understood to be communication and participative discussion for decision making, it is far from it. The meetings are sometimes not focused, not properly directed and very lengthy. I had participated in meetings conducted over 12 hours, of course with breaks in between. Many times the participants of such meetings feel miserable for loss of valuable time. It has been observed that some persons are inattentive (or may even sleep for a while), speak very little or do not make positive contribution to the meetings. This could be due to inadequate and unsatisfactory preparation or home work for the points required for the meeting. Many bosses have a meeting mania for various reasons like communication of the decisions already taken, shouting at and humiliating some person(s) in front of others and their ego satisfaction etc. Sometimes people do not reach in the meeting in time and the late comers do not express sorry even. If a subordinate is having connections with the higher ups, he may make life miserable for his boss even. Sometimes they may make fun of such meetings and find ways and means to avoid them. Time is money .Therefore we should not be a party to waste of precious time of the employees of the organization. Short meetings are desirable. The number of persons required to participate in the meetings should be kept to the minimum required number. The objectives and topics of the meeting should be clear and known to all the participants in advance like exchange or sharing of general information and avoiding gaps, expected points/decisions, willingness to listen to employee’s points, clarity of communication of a decision or evolving of a decision etc. If senior and junior level meetings are conducted separately, there is likely to be lesser loss of time. But at the same time the employees should prepare their points in advance and present them properly giving adequate reasons, so as to clinch the points. In the meeting, if it has been decided to take some actions, the persons who should initiate them should also be decided and minutes of the meeting issued thereafter early. After the meeting is over, its outcome should be evaluated whether the objectives for calling the meeting have been achieved. In any case, in all these matters, everyone should ultimately consider only the betterment of the organization, as the guiding factor.